The Next Three Things

P. Andrew Jones, Esq.

Lawrence Jones Custer Grasmick LLP

Photo Credit: Alex Kerney Photo Credit: Public Domain

A System to Fit the Land

• Riparian System • “Reasonable Use” by riparian

landowners • Shortage-”Share and share alike”

• Prior Appropriation System

• Any party could use water • Shortage- “First in time, first in right” • Rights transferable

Photos Credit: Public Domain

Booming Agriculture

• Establishing a right • Diversion • Application to beneficial use • No waste • No speculation • Conditional Rights

• Changing rivers • Return flows

Trans-Basin Diversions

• 80% of Colorado’s population is east of the Rocky Mountains • 80% of Colorado’s water supply is west of the Rocky Mountains

Photo Credit: Public Domain Photo Credit: Public Domain

Great and Growing Cities

• Change of Water Rights – Measure-historical use

• “Injury Standard” • Trans-Basin Diversions

– Fully consumable – “Re-use” programs – C-BT Project

Photo Credit: Yassie (talk) Wikimedia Commons

1. They Will Come; You Must Build It

Photo Credit: Yassie (talk) Wikimedia Commons

• Statewide Water Supply Initiative Study

• Population • 100,000 (1876) • 5,116,796 (2011) • 7,156,400 (2030) • Increase 2,000,000 • 85% on Front Range

1. They Will Come; You Must Build It

Photo Credit: Yassie (talk) Wikimedia Commons

• Water Supplies • Increased Demand

• 630,000 af • Planned projects:

511,800 af • Gap: 118,200 af, IF

all projects completed

1. They Will Come; You Must Build It

Photo Credit: Yassie (talk) Wikimedia Commons

• Water Supplies • Increased Demand

• 630,000 af • Planned projects:

511,800 af • Gap: 118,200 af, IF all

projects completed

1. They Will Come; You Must Build It

Photo Credit: Yassie (talk) Wikimedia Commons

• Decreasing Agriculture • 85% of water supply is

used for Agriculture • Dry-up 144,000 acres IF all

planned project completed

• 50% completed, 596,000 acres (18% of irrigated farms in state)

• Many providers with no plans beyond 2030

• Infrastructure: Not a question of whether, but of where and how

2. Make Room at the Table

• In Stream Flow Rights • Colorado Water

Conservation Board • Recreational In-Channel

Diversions (RICD) • Level of Participation

• Unknown, not invited • Crashing the party • A place at the table

• Environmental and recreational interests will take a meaningful place at the table.

Photo Credit: Alex Kerney

Photo Credit : Ethan Emery, Angling University

- “Too valuable to fight over” - Re-use of effluent - Alternatives to Dry-Up: fallowing, reduced CU cropping, deficit irrigation - Infrastructure: Storage (above ground, underground), delivery

mechanisms - Scarcity will drive increasing cooperation, shared and multiple uses

Photo Credit: Alex Kerney Photo Credit: Public Domain

Photo Credit: Yassie (talk) Wikimedia Commons

3. Multiple Uses, Shared Uses

On the Cache La Poudre River, 1876

On the Cache La Poudre River, 1876 Worthington Whittredge (1820-1910)